Although the Obama administration has made it clear that it wants to pursue
diplomacy with Iran and the president himself has made overtures toward Iran,
Israel continues to threaten Iran with military attacks. Its lobby in the United
States, led by AIPAC and its supporters in the War Party, continues to issue
dire warnings about Iran’s nuclear program and the danger that it allegedly
poses to not just Israel and the Middle East, but the entire "free world."
Meanwhile, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has reaffirmed time
and again that all of Iran’s known nuclear facilities and nuclear materials,
including its stockpile of low-enriched uranium, are safeguarded and monitored
by the agency; there is no evidence for a secret parallel nuclear program,
or one that is aimed at developing nuclear weapons; and all the issues regarding
Iran’s six cases of noncompliance with its obligations under its Safeguards
Agreement with the IAEA have been resolved to the agency’s satisfaction.

Over the past several months, the chief mouthpiece for Israel, particularly
Benjamin Netanyahu and his government, has been Elliott Abrams, a convicted
criminal (later pardoned) in the Iran-Contra scandal, son-in-law of Norman
Podhoretz (former editor of Commentary and the man who prayed that
George W. Bush would order military attacks on Iran), and deputy national security
adviser for the Middle East in the Bush White House. Abrams is now at the Council
on Foreign Relations.

Acting as Netanyahu’s alter ego and trying to deflect attention from what
Israel did to the Gaza Strip in December and January, in March Abrams propagated
the absurd notion that Iran was sending weapons to Hamas by a route
through Sudan and Egypt. The story first appeared
in January on a Web site that has close ties with Israel’s intelligence services.
Then the Times of London, the Rupert Murdoch-owned bastion of truthfulness,
ran
a story about it. Abrams suggested that Iran ships arms to Sudan, which
are then transported through Egypt and the Sinai Desert to reach Hamas in Gaza.
How the weapons smugglers could evade the intelligence services of Egypt, a
nation that has been ruled by president-for-life Hosni Mubarak with emergency
laws since 1981, is beyond the comprehension of the author and, indeed, most
objective analysts.

When the allegations regarding Iran sending weapons to Hamas did not catch
fire, Abrams created a new twist in the propaganda campaign against Iran. In
an article in the Weekly Standard on March 2, Abrams, declaring his
opposition to the withdrawal of Israel’s forces from the occupied territories,
opined,"he Israeli-Palestinian conflict is now part of a broader struggle
in the region over Iranian extremism and power. Israeli withdrawals now risk
opening the door not only to Palestinian terrorists but to Iranian proxies."

In other words, Abrams suggested that not only must the Palestinians wait
decades to get their independent state, if ever, but also that they will not
get it unless Iran is contained first. By then, of course, the facts on the
ground, i.e., Israel’s settlements in the West Bank, will have dramatically
changed.

Since then it has become an article of faith among Israel’s supporters and
the War Party that, in order to achieve a lasting peace in the Middle East,
Iran’s nuclear program must first be halted. Never mind that the Israel-Palestinian
conflict existed long before the Islamic Republic of Iran was established in
1979 and that Israel maintained secret relations with Iran, selling it weapons
and spare parts for the its American-made armament, until the Iran-Contra scandal,
in which Abrams himself played a leading role, put an end to the engagement.

Tying the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the containment
of Iran’s nuclear program is part of the absurd argument that Iran’s nonexistent
nuclear weapons program poses an "existential threat" to the Jewish
state. This false notion has been repeated so often that any opposition to
it is treated as tantamount to treason or supporting Iran’s "mad mullahs."
Never mind that, Tzipi Livni, Israel’s former prime minister, stated
last year that, even if Iran did develop a nuclear arsenal, it would pose
little threat to Israel. She even criticized Ehud Olmert, her predecessor,
for exaggerating the Iranian nuclear issue for political gain.

Despite Livni’s admission, the myth of Iran’s "existential threat"
to Israel is very much alive. In the latest twist, Jeffrey Goldberg of The
Atlantic, while conceding that Netanyahu has a reputation for "conspicuous
insincerity," claimed that his preoccupation with the Iranian nuclear
program seems sincere and deeply felt. Writing in the New York Times
on May 17, Goldberg
stated, "I recently asked one of his [Netanyahu’s] advisers to gauge
for me the depth of Mr. Netanyahu’s anxiety about Iran. His answer: ‘Think
Amalek.’" According to the Old Testament, the Amalekites were great enemies
of the Jews, attacking them on their escape from Egypt. Thus, metaphorically,
Iran’s nonexistent nuclear weapons program is our era’s Amalek’s arsenal. In
the past Netanyahu has also repeatedly claimed that it is 1938 all over again,
Iran is the new Nazi Germany, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the new
Hitler, an absurd and baseless notion I
have refuted before.

Another notion propagated by Israel’s supporters is that Iran
is ruled by a messianic, apocalyptic group so bent on destroying Israel
that it does not care about retaliatory strikes. This is sheer nonsense. Iran’s
leaders, despite their rhetoric, are rational
and pragmatic politicians, at least when it comes to foreign policy. What
better evidence for their pragmatism than the fact that they bought weapons
from Israel in the 1980s; that in the conflict between Christian Armenia and
Shi’ite Azerbaijan, Iran sided with the former; that Iran played a crucial
role in the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, when its ally, the Northern Alliance,
took Kabul? Moreover, Iran’s leaders are also fully aware that any attack on
Israel will provoke a massive counterattack by both Israel and the U.S. that
will destroy Iran and kill millions of Iranians.

So what is the crux of the issue? Goldberg quotes Netanyahu as saying that
"Iran’s militant proxies would be able to fire rockets and engage in other
terror activities while enjoying a nuclear umbrella." This statement provides
some insight into Netanyahu’s thinking.

Netanyahu, the Likud, and Israel’s far Right, including quasi-fascist Foreign
Minister Avigdor Lieberman, would like to be able to do to their occupied territories
whatever they please without any hindrance. They do
not recognize the internationally recognized right of the Palestinians
to have their own independent, viable state, and they want to continue building
settlements in the West Bank.

At the same time, about half
of the water used in Israel is captured and diverted from its neighbors,
including the occupied territories of the West Bank and the Golan Heights.
Many of these water sources are running out. Thus, Israel needs new sources.
One such source is the Litani River in southern Lebanon, which, at its closest
point, is about two miles from the border with Israel. Even before Israel’s
establishment, its leaders have had their eyes on the Litani. David Ben-Gurion
and Moshe Dayan both advocated Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon and the
Litani. As early as 1941, Ben-Gurion
thought that the Litani should be Israel’s northern border. Israel’s invasions
of southern Lebanon in 1978 and 1982 were partly motivated by its desire to
control the Litani. In fact, there was a big row in 1994 when Israel was accused
of diverting water from the Litani, just as it steals the water resources of
the Golan Heights. All that ended when Hezbollah forced Israel to leave southern
Lebanon after an 18-year occupation.

So the crux of the issue is not that Iran is ruled by a messianic, apocalyptic
group, or that it has a secret nuclear weapon program, or that if it gets its
hands on nuclear warheads, it will attack Israel. None of these are true.

The crux of the issue is not that, emboldened by Iran’s nonexistent nuclear
weapons, Hezbollah and Hamas will keep firing rockets into Israel. Both are
supported by Iran, but neither is its proxy. Hamas’ ambition is limited to
recovering the occupied territories. It has never carried out any military
or terrorist operation outside of historical Palestine, and it has offered
to go into a decades-long cease-fire with Israel in exchange for Israel’s complete
evacuation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Iran is also not the only Muslim
state that supports Hamas.

Hezbollah is a powerful sociopolitical movement in Lebanon that would continue
to thrive without any help from Iran. It is part of Lebanon’s government and
has a significant presence in the Lebanese parliament. It is expected to increase
its votes in the parliamentary elections on June 7. It is regarded by many
Lebanese people as the guardian of southern Lebanon and the Litani.

The crux of the issue is also not what Netanyahu told Goldberg, namely, that
a nuclear Iran "would embolden Islamic militants far and wide, on many
continents." Those Islamic militants, including both the Taliban and al-Qaeda,
are almost exclusively Salafi Sunnis who hate Shi’ite Iran.

Such a scenario would also have another consequence. A situation in which
Israel’s government maintains a permanent state of war with its neighbors,
but in which Israel and the Muslims are in equilibrium militarily, would halt
immigration to Israel, even reverse it. That would be the ultimate existential
threat to Israel. The only realistic way to prevent this from happening is
for Israel to reach a just peace with the Palestinians and Syria and give up
the dream of controlling the Litani River. But, Netanyahu, the Likud, and the
Israeli establishment are incapable of making these happen, and the progressive
forces that could force such a solution have practically disappeared from Israel’s
political scene.

iran is indeed an existential threat to the zionist state of israel for the day peace is declared what right has israel to keep out arab migration by what right does it have to continue to seize land, and for the time being they have been blessed by the cruelest of god to be for the moment only the little occupier in the middle east.
and don't be fooled this can go on for a very long time becuase while im all for it the reality is that if,,when we are force to leave iraq israel will have there old best enemy back and if any one hopes to rules iraq as a single country a conflict with israel will be very useful political tool. so history goes round and round, and damocles patiently watches over us all.

Israel needs to completely displace the Palestinians, and sieze control of the Litani, before Iran acquires nuclear weapons. The Palestinians can be marched at gunpoint into Lebanon and Jordan, or boatlifted to Somalia. That way the facts on the ground can be established. The best time to do it would be after Obama cuts off Israel's funding, and Israel should provoke this. That way Israel would have nothing to lose by cleansing the territories of enemy populations for good.

And for good measure Iran should be nuked into the stone age, as the Palestinians are being marched, to ensure they can't achieve parity with Israel in the near future.

Oh Andrewp111, I can only hope that bad dream of yours trails off to a more generalized hallucination of widespread mayhem. Is there NO way forward that is beneficial to the woebegone Palestinians …??

Will the Israelis really try to march them off from their homes of the last thousand years to an uncertain fate beset by the "charity of strangers"..?? As the Israeli military 'holds off' any would be rescue with their nuclear weapons and the best lobby money can buy…?? It would create an entire new dyshporia
that would be a wellspring for an entire new era of violence and terror..!! OH, NO!! Say it aint so Jo……

I was taught to expect more from a rabbi, but through the years, I've found that they usually know less than their DEDICATED congregants. rabbi feinstein says: In reply to “What’s Netanyahu Really Afraid Of?” by Muhammad Sahimi, May 20, 2009:

Muhammid Sahimi’s article, “What’s Netanyahu Really Afraid Of” is so far away from truth and fact that it doesn’t merit placement in any objective media. To use as a talking point “what Israel did in Gaza in December and January” without even mentioning the reason for the incursion is in the politest of terms “horsehockey.” How long must an independent nation suffer repeated rocket attacks on their civilian population before taking necessary steps to stop it? As far as Iran ’s nuclear enrichment program, “Bibi” said it best. “When someone says he is going to kill you, believe him.”

Rabbi Jeffery Feinstein

Maybe if the good rabbi would spend less time parsing words and studying begats and begats, he might come across this reality:

Muhammad Sahimi, Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science and the NIOC Chair in Petroleum Engineering at the University of Southern California, is co-founder and editor of the website, Iran News & Middle East Reports.